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RE: Competing Specifications - A Good or Bad Thing?

• To: rjm@z...
• Subject: RE: Competing Specifications - A Good or Bad Thing?
• From: Henrik Martensson <henrik.martensson@b...>
• Date: Wed, 07 Apr 2004 02:54:43 +0200
• Cc: "Bullard, Claude L (Len)" <clbullar@i...>, "'Jim Rankin'" <jimbokun_lists@m...>, XML Developer List <xml-dev@l...>
• In-reply-to: <1081289675.2467.8.camel@z...>
• References: <15725CF6AFE2F34DB8A5B4770B7334EE03F9F5C2@h...> <1081289675.2467.8.camel@z...>

On Wed, 2004-04-07 at 00:14, Rick Marshall wrote:
> actually len i think the trick is to keep building simple things that
> can interact. the total system can be amazingly complex, but each
> component simple, verifiable, and understood.

I agree completely. The behavior of an ant is comparatively simple, but
an ant-hill can be considered an organism with very complex behavior.

The same idea holds in object oriented programming. Test driven
methodologies, such as XP, provide very good examples of how this works.
Each class in a system should be fairly simple. Automated unit and
function tests makes the behavior of objects, and groups of interacting
objects, well known. As a result, complex systems can be built, if not
easily, at least with a high degree of confidence that the thing will
work.

> 
> so, in this matter i disagree. lots of simple things are still simple
> things, even if their interaction is so complex it can never be fully
> understood.

And the amazing thing is that when building with simple things, you
don't even have to completely understand, or control, all the
interactions to make the more complex things work.

/Henrik

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  • RE: Competing Specifications - A Good or Bad Thing?
    • From: "Bullard, Claude L (Len)" <clbullar@i...>
  • RE: Competing Specifications - A Good or Bad Thing?
    • From: Rick Marshall <rjm@z...>

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